MX Linux Forum

Hi MX'ers and AVL-MX'ers

Just posting on the progress and Roadmap for AVL-MXE Bullseye/MX 21... I've had a rare indoor afternoon to get organized so I thought I would share whats happening with AVL-MXE development... Still probably a month or more away from building ISO's and of course will keep out of the way until MX 21 is complete and released. My AVL-MXE Bullseye test machine is performing very well and there are some new features coming..
Full size here: http://bandshed.net/images/screenshots/ ... 21-WIP.png

New features:

-> A sad but necessary goodbye to the 32bit version, almost no new Audio software Developers provide 32 bit binaries or test on 32bit Systems.
-> New Liquorix default Kernels, serious Kernel security exploits are far too commonplace for part time people (like myself and Trulan) to be maintaining ISO default Kernels any more.
-> RT Kernels will now be optionally available from the AV Linux Kernel Repo.
-> Complete new modularized AVL-MXE Assistant!
-> More detail attention paid to Openbox and also detail updates and enhancements to the default Diehard theme.
-> Thunar-based Deb installation and improvements to AV Custom Actions
-> Move to Yabridge for Windows VST Plugin hosting and a built-in graphical utility to manage Yabridge
-> Saner defaults for dual-head systems
-> Updates and expansion of the AVL-MXE User Manual
-> Stripping out of KDE Apps, LibreOffice and a handful of peripheral applications.. An Audio/Video focused Live media doesn't need a full office suite..
-> Updates to all of the major DAWs and Plugin Demos

More updates to come as I have time to work on them. Sincere thanks as always to the MX Devs and Packagers for the tireless work on MX-21!!

Exciting!

Let us know if you want to use build-iso script to build AVLinux... it might be a bit more flexible and clean than remastering (if that's what you do right now).

Adrian wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 7:04 pm Let us know if you want to use build-iso script to build AVLinux... it might be a bit more flexible and clean than remastering (if that's what you do right now).

Hmmm, that sounds interesting! I will reach out via PM when I'm getting close to building some testing ISO's, thanks very much for the kind offer!

Is this av linux MX Edition with pipewire version? or can pulseaudio replace with pipewire in the new versi of AVL -MXE 2021?

Thanks in Advanced

afiadi wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 2:08 am Is this av linux MX Edition with pipewire version? or can pulseaudio replace with pipewire in the new versi of AVL -MXE 2021?

Thanks in Advanced

Hi,

My feeling is that Pipewire is still a future thing and not yet mature enough to make the default sound server. AVL-MXE has a very good setup with JACK and PulseAudio bridges that pretty much can route any Audio from anywhere you want to the selected Sound Device. I don't think Pipewire in Debian Bullseye is quite there (yet). My guess would be that future AVL-MXE releases after Bullseye with likely have Pipewire by default.

This is really exciting. Thank you so much, GMaq. Looking forward to it!

As far as pipewire is concerned, I've been playing around with it in Manjaro and although it's an amazing tool, it still lacks polish, and most important, it lacks management tools which are still in development (eg. Helvum patchbay and tools for setting buffer size and sample rate). So I think you made the right choice in sticking with jack and pulseaudio in AVL-MXE-Bullseye, it's a stable and safe choice for professional use.

I appreciate the adoption of yabridge, it's an amazing tool, and the development of yabridge-UI.

Oh, one more thing, AVL-Diehard themes and DarK icon theme will no longer be used? (I must admit I don't really like them and I would like to be able to use more "vanilla" themes like Papirus and mx-comfort without losing system icons and other stuff). What about QT apps? Any chance of using Kvantum over qt5-ct?

Hi, thanks!

Uhm Dark Icons...no, XFCE4 4.16 kinda broke them and forces their own XFCE4 Icons whether you want them or not so yes Papirus will be default and more 'generic' system Icons will be pointed to by the AVL-MXE Applications.. But Diehard will still be the default theming with some nice new color matched Papirus folders so that sucks for you lol!

But seriously changing themes should be more seamless this time around... lesson learned! To be honest I don't fully understand the relationships between QT, KDE and Kvantum and I am hoping for simplicity and ISO space to eliminate KDE libs entirely.. Obviously many people will end up installing KDE applications and that is their prerogative but if Kvantum needs a bunch of KDE stuff I will stay with qt5ct because I understand it and it works predictably.

Thank you so much for your answer and for all the good work. Looking forward for AVL-MXE 2021 Bullseye/MX21.

AVLinux wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 6:52 pm ....
Obviously many people will end up installing KDE applications and that is their prerogative but if Kvantum needs a bunch of KDE stuff I will stay with qt5ct because I understand it and it works predictably.

or switch to Kde (Hi Glen!)
My main problem with Xfce is the lack of fractional scaling ,which is a must for me in laptops nowadays , plus nowadays Kde is super light

korakios wrote: Wed Sep 08, 2021 1:07 pm ... plus nowadays Kde is super light

Hardly.

korakios wrote: Wed Sep 08, 2021 1:07 pm

AVLinux wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 6:52 pm ....
Obviously many people will end up installing KDE applications and that is their prerogative but if Kvantum needs a bunch of KDE stuff I will stay with qt5ct because I understand it and it works predictably.

or switch to Kde (Hi Glen!)
My main problem with Xfce is the lack of fractional scaling ,which is a must for me in laptops nowadays , plus nowadays Kde is super light

Hi there korakios!

BTW your CPU Frequency Utility still works great!!

Haha! Sorry no KDE for this guy, I'm a minimalist and I'm still learning everything about XFCE4! KDE would take a whole other lifetime to learn and I'm on the wrong side of the hill!! I'm starting to go the other way... back toward LXDE like in the early AV Linux days. I'm not as brave (or skillful) as @anticapitalista to go all the way down the minimalist road (well yet anyway).. That said KDE Plasma can indeed be a beautiful D.E. in the hands of those who know how to set it up efficiently.

I am totally onboard with XFCE and possibly even a modified LXDE (ie. - with a more full featured window manager.)

That being said I really miss the "tweakability" that is available in KDE. When I used to have my RocXshoP distro I insisted on KDE and was able to strip it to the bare essentials, but all that changed with KDE 4 which dragged in everything and the kitchen sink. I've been a happy XFCE user ever since.

AVLinux wrote: Sun Sep 05, 2021 2:24 pm

afiadi wrote: Sat Sep 04, 2021 2:08 am Is this av linux MX Edition with pipewire version? or can pulseaudio replace with pipewire in the new versi of AVL -MXE 2021?

Thanks in Advanced

Hi,

My feeling is that Pipewire is still a future thing and not yet mature enough to make the default sound server. AVL-MXE has a very good setup with JACK and PulseAudio bridges that pretty much can route any Audio from anywhere you want to the selected Sound Device. I don't think Pipewire in Debian Bullseye is quite there (yet). My guess would be that future AVL-MXE releases after Bullseye with likely have Pipewire by default.

Thanks you so much for your reply and explanation

Hi, GMaq! Will there be a release candidate ou test ISO for enthusiasts and early adopters? I would love to give it a go.

Hi!

Yes I think there will certainly be at least 1 or 2 RC's to go bug hunting with, I will post here when I'm getting closer.. Right now I haven't got time to work on it in a sustained way and I'm picking away at cosmetic stuff and litle details as time permits, there is a lot more work to do!

First off, thanks so much for your tireless effort on AVL - so many of the silent masses rely on it day to day, you have no idea :)

One thing that seems to be getting rougher with each release is the accelerated release schedules for popular packages combined with the seeming ubiquitous lack of time for all maintainers (yourself very much included !) Because of this, so many are moving away from traditional repo style releases and instead moving to the newer more singular-focused distribution methods like PPA and Flatpack. Like your comment about the time needed to learn new stuff is all but wasted once you have a method to your madness, I for one spent the better part of 3 full days going through the AVL-deploy=>PPA install attempt=>remaster=>fail=>start-over process just to get Mixxx 2.3.0 installed (debian is always so behind that they don't even have 2.3.0 anywhere on their radar at this point - haha).

If you can think of any intermediate utility that you might be able to include that could streamline the process for users to install both PPAs and Flatpacks, it would be a huge win for everyone. Just because a PPA or Flatpack bombs out and doesn't work, at least the users don't have to spend a couple days just figuring out the logistics of PPA/Flatpack deployment within MXL in order to find out.

Anyway, just a thought. Keep up the great work on this wonderful distro ! :)

Hello!

Thanks for the kind words, I stopped looking at my server metrics years ago and I often wonder if AVL ever works right for anyone or if more than 5 people use it...lol

Since I'm on MX now you can at least take advantage of their own flatpak implementation in their native MX Package installer (so MX-Tools-->MX Package Installer), it works well, MUCH better than the horrid Gnome flatpak store frontend in Debian that I just gave up on after a few attempts to merge it into AV Linux... As far as PPA's that is kind of a bad word here in MX Circles... the general feeling here is PPA's: bad!... requesting desired packages for the MX Repositories: good!

I've had to explain and assure folks here that even a long-term trusted Debian PPA like KX Studio is acceptable so I think we can cover the flatpaks with MX's existing infrastructure but I think as a maintainer I have to leave PPA's and the potential pitfalls that can go with them to the discretion and risk of the end-user. Generally speaking with a few exceptions... PPA's are a Ubuntu-centric thing and often not well tolerated by 'purer' Debian Systems.

AVLinux wrote: Wed Sep 29, 2021 2:47 pm I often wonder if AVL ever works right for anyone or if more than 5 people use it…lol

I think you'd be surprised :)

AVLinux wrote: Wed Sep 29, 2021 2:47 pm Since I'm on MX now you can at least take advantage of their own flatpak implementation in their native MX Package installer (so MX-Tools-->MX Package Installer)

As with so many deep crevices of teh Interwebs [sic] there's just too much knowledge to be knowledgeable about - I previously found far-outdated info about the MX "test" repo and seeing only 2.2.0 in it in the MX Package Manager, dismissed it as a lost cause… which curtailed me pursuing further regarding the flatpack support now added to MX Package Manager. Low and behold, my source-install of Mixxxx was premature as 2.3.0 is gloriously present in the not-by-default-available flatpack repos in MX Package Manager (I'm kicking the tires of it now to ensure it behaves as the source-install did)

For context, I've modified a Numark Party Mix dj controller to have a USB3 internal hub + 512GB MicroSD card with AVL-live installed to it on a 48GB slice of the SD card (with remaining space partitioned as exfat music library) to allow Live efi boot to AVL to run Mixxx 2.3.0 on any EFI-capable system and have my full performance environment available by just plugging in my back-packable mini controller. It's pretty clutch :)

Thanks again for the continued effort. If I can think of some way to be able to more easily communicate to those outside-the-box users like myself to help them reconfigure AVL to their needs, I'll let you know. I just hate the thought of others going through all the pain and suffering I had, when it wasn't necessary.

Cheers !

-=dave

@fiveangle to tack onto what has already been said, the issues with Ubuntu specific PPAs is that:

1) they are built against the version of Ubuntu the PPA is for which may not align with the or even a actual Debian version, this can sometime cause issues, so it’s not recommended

2) PPAs aren’t always trusted sources, anyone can make them, so while someone may be doing it just to help, they may not know what they are doing and the package built could be missing things (dependencies) or not be build properly and cause issues. This also speaks to testing, who knows if that PPA maintainer tested it much, if at all.

Glen gave us a list of primary packages to try and keep up to date as much as we can. We test them (as much as we can) before adding them to the Repo. You don’t have to wonder as much if it will really work or be stable.

The only down side to this is the packages may not be the absolute newest (sometimes a limitation of the Debian version too) and you may have to wait for the MX packaging team… but it’s a good trade off rather than trying to troubleshoot or wonder why something doesn’t work right when you could be spending time doing cool A/V stuff instead.

We’d be more than happy if someone came alone to support Glen in a dedicated way to keep packages up… until then you’ll have to wait to the very slow packaging team… I mean we’re real slow sometimes… like sometimes the same day kinda slow.

Hi,

Not a huge development and of limited importance but since moving to MX I've been wanting to change my logo and make it more kind of instantly recognizable and efforts to blend the MX Logo with the former AV Linux Logo were not really graphically sound and resulted in a confusing text-heavy logo that didn't scale well for buttons etc. I put out a call for assistance on the linuxmusicians forum and 'bhilmers' knocked it out of the park by helping me get a Waveform logo idea to it's final stage.

You can see the new logo in my Avatar and a full screenshot here:
http://bandshed.net/images/screenshots/ ... enie-2.png

I really like it! AVL-MXE 21 is getting really pretty on the eyes. Thanks for all your work Glen!

Nice logo. Screenshot (wallpaper) looks pretty badass.

Glen, i'm in a bit of a quandry here, and I respectfully offer a suggestion.

I've been through the kx repos, and the audiomedia apps the MX packaging emperors have kindly built for us. There's now far less in the kx repos that isn't MX packaged than there is. On top of that, there seems to be quite a few KX apps and plugins that haven't been updated for a while. Then there's the whole PPA Ubuntu/Debian saga of what seems always on the edge of, might/might not work. FalkTX did a mighty job in his day, but is it time for us to evolve, so as to keep things up to date on a regular basis?

In other words, and at the risk of starting a conflict, (and i've already donned the flack jacket and helmet in anticipation) is it time to stop using the KX repos, and stick to "ours", that is the mighty MX emperors work, and yours, where we can all benefit from the simplicity of fewer repos, and as a result, fewer things to go wrong?

I offer this as a point of debate, not a whine.

Alex.

alextone wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:14 am Glen, i'm in a bit of a quandry here, and I respectfully offer a suggestion.

I've been through the kx repos, and the audiomedia apps the MX packaging emperors have kindly built for us. There's now far less in the kx repos that isn't MX packaged than there is. On top of that, there seems to be quite a few KX apps and plugins that haven't been updated for a while. Then there's the whole PPA Ubuntu/Debian saga of what seems always on the edge of, might/might not work. FalkTX did a mighty job in his day, but is it time for us to evolve, so as to keep things up to date on a regular basis?

In other words, and at the risk of starting a conflict, (and i've already donned the flack jacket and helmet in anticipation) is it time to stop using the KX repos, and stick to "ours", that is the mighty MX emperors work, and yours, where we can all benefit from the simplicity of fewer repos, and as a result, fewer things to go wrong?

I offer this as a point of debate, not a whine.

Alex.

Hi Alex,

I don't disagree and you're absolutely right@SwampRabbit has been extremely receptive and gone far above and beyond to get important Audio/Video 'Applications' into MX Repos for our benefit. However KX still has an important role to fill as a source for Carla and numerous DISTRHO and related Audio 'Plugins' (Calf, LSP etc..) which are still kept up by falkTX. For the incredible workload and the sheer volume of available Plugins out there I have strongly advised the MX Packagers to not get on the slippery slope of Audio Plugins, it would be a bottomless and thankless task and I/we are already asking and receiving a LOT from our MX benefactors.

I have clearly pointed out the external Repositories used in AVL-MXE and their purpose in the User Manual and for the time being the KX PPA is Debian-friendly and still a good resource for Plugins even though the applications have fallen by the wayside for quite some time... I think at the current time with the understanding of the limitations we are in good hands with the combination of KX for Plugins and MX for hosts..

Aaah, ok, understood.

I'm good with doing the major packages, often referred to as "gap packages" for AVL-MXE, but its in my voluntary spare time within voluntary spare time.
I try to update these packages to some degree for the previous versions of AVL-MXE if there are critical bugs, but mostly my focus is on the latest major version of AVL-MXE.
I try to update a few extras here and there, but the priority for me at least is on the ones I was told are important to AVL-MXE.

I only do this because Glen is such a great guy, I think AVL-MXE is awesome in general, and I know it is important for many people.
But this is still an genltemen's agreement for unofficial Respin support.
I striked that out on purpose.

There is always an open invitation to anyone serious and dedicated to helping AVL-MXE with packaging, its not overly hard as most of the time its just backports, grabbing a few things from the developers upstream, and testing. Its time more than anything else.

@SwapRabbit o your not a gentlemen then :) But as user of avl and mx for years, great full for all the time you all put into it.

SwampRabbit wrote: Thu Oct 14, 2021 9:58 pm I'm good with doing the major packages, often referred to as "gap packages" for AVL-MXE, but its in my voluntary spare time within voluntary spare time.
I try to update these packages to some degree for the previous versions of AVL-MXE if there are critical bugs, but mostly my focus is on the latest major version of AVL-MXE.
I try to update a few extras here and there, but the priority for me at least is on the ones I was told are important to AVL-MXE.

I only do this because Glen is such a great guy, I think AVL-MXE is awesome in general, and I know it is important for many people.
But this is still an genltemen's agreement for unofficial Respin support.
I striked that out on purpose.

There is always an open invitation to anyone serious and dedicated to helping AVL-MXE with packaging, its not overly hard as most of the time its just backports, grabbing a few things from the developers upstream, and testing. Its time more than anything else.

If I could package, i'd be on it. AVL-MXE is an excellent distro.

I can relate to the time limitation. Is there a walkthrough somewhere that will give me at least a basic understanding of packaging for Debian/AVL? If i can figure it out, i'll try and assist.

Alex.

@alextone we can follow up outside of this thread later after MX-21 stuff has settle down a bit.

Ok.

@alextone @SwampRabbit

First of all thanks so much again SwampRabbit on behalf of myself and all MX Users wanting to do multimedia work, I wish the nature of my work and time for AVL was more linear or I would jump into the packaging but I am often unable to devote much more than a quick forum check over lunch between really productive periods of working on the ISO so having somebody like Alex who used the system and has first hand experience with the applications would be a huge asset for sure!

@AVLinux you're too kind sir.

I'll follow up with Alex once things with MX-21 settle in.

A little update...

I have been working with the last release of AVL-MXE 2021 (based on MX-19.4) manually upgraded to Bullseye and that was the direction I was headed for the next release but after observing the amazing process of how the MX devs curated and improved the new MX-21 Wildflower release and seeing how many internal things have changed within Debian from Buster to Bullseye I think it would be best for me to take and build on a pristine MX-21 base, I also think this will be a better step for many other reasons too. Over time as AVL-MXE becomes closer to MX it also shrinks the potential variables between the two so getting help for Users should be more streamlined because MX and AVL-MXE will have more and more in common as time goes on.

Ideally it would be best for me to start with an MX-21 minimal install as @m_pav created for MX-19, these are not available yet but hopefully they will be at some point in the near future. In the meantime I will be working on finishing and Packaging the various AV Linux Themes, Utilities and supplemental specialty bits and pieces so they can simply be dropped in and installed smoothly into the new MX-21 base and I am considering documenting everything I've done so if existing MX User's want to convert an existing install into an AVL influenced one then they can simply follow a guide.

Another option to explore is the developer build scripts which may be the best long term solution but I need to dig deep on time and erase a lot of bad habits first...

Lastly @SwampRabbit has provided a batch of multimedia testing packages to be included into the Stable MX-21 Repos... I've been busy offline and fallen behind on testing them but I will make sure to complete that this weekend, once tested and into the MX-21 Repos they will be there for all MX Users to enjoy!

@AVLinux there are updated versions of some of those packages, but I'm holding off on them for the mean time, take your time testing though as these newer app releases need time to settle anyway.

Some big strides made this week!

A progress report of sorts:
https://youtu.be/cg9tiKFsrBo

A welcome splash thingie... Lots of tuning to do yet.

Do not take names and dates seriously at all... all up in the air right now.

I was going to base it on mx-welcome (I still might) but I have zero QT programming experience and mx-welcome has a lot of cool stuff I don't need at this point so back to YAD I went.. I do think I will align with the MX versions and naming schemes instead of year and date...so

"AV Linux MX-21 Edition" instead of "AVL-MXE-2021.11.15" or whatever. I'm really aiming for this next release to be much more integrated with MX with less external moving parts.

This is all so exciting. Thank you so much, Glen!